2. music
  3. 182463-171430

Why Do Some Recordings Sound Great and Others Dead?

I listen to Radio Paradise MQA on my NODE 3, SMSL M400, B and O Beolab 8000’s and Hsu 15in sealed sub.  The acoustics in my room are poor.  I’ve noticed that some recordings sound very realistic. For instance the vocals on a Stabat Mater dolorosa hymn sounded great.  But a Nora Jones recording was terrible.  Her voice was lost in back of some murky instruments.  I’m familiar with this recording listening to it on my iPod, where her voice shines out and the music is good.  I’m wondering why the big differences?

128x128tcotruvo

Showing 4 responses by zlone

zlone
381 posts
 

One more thought, as an experiment you might try removing your DAC from the chain and let the Node do everything to see if you still hear significant differences between songs. 

zlone
381 posts
 

I listen to RP a lot and the quality is pretty consistent, especially on the Mellow Mix station. Question, how are you controlling volume in your chain? Node, SMSL, Beolabs?

zlone
381 posts
 

A couple suggestions:

1) I assume you have 'Audio Level Fixed' set on the Node? Not sure that is settable if you bypass the DAC, but make sure it is set to pass through.

2) Try listening to RP's FLAC lossless stream instead of MQA. MQA adds a lot of complexity, maybe some songs are not being expanded correctly.

3) Looking at the M400 manual, it is pretty lean on explanations, but I see reference to various filters, phase and brightness settings. Not sure these are all relevant, but maybe some adjustment could make a difference.

 

zlone
381 posts
 

Revision, I see that phase applies to balanced and brightness is for the display. But maybe the PCM filters are relevant.

 

More to discover